HER SILENCE JUSTIFIED.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9532, 2 July 1909, Page 2

HER SILENCE JUSTIFIED.

CHAPTER XXXIV.-Continued.

Besides, they have so much to ask. Ha! had been aware that during his childhood, which was spent at a school near Southampton, he had been occasionally visited by a female who called herself his aunt; and he knew that it was to her solicitations he owed the home given him by the good old clergyman. But these visits had ceased when in her character as a nurse Daisy went abroad, and she had contented herself with learning from the clergyman's letters that her boy was developing into a very different man from his father. While she gave these explanations and the general congratulated himself and Hal on the tie between them, Laurence disappeared. Only Ambra saw him go; but at her piteous entreaty Wilfred Stuart followed his footsteps arid strove to induce him to retrieve his errors by acknowledging and atoning for them. For the best of fathers, a wife like Daisy, and a son of whom | the most exacting might be proud, would he not make some few sacrifices and lower his haughty crest? But the reply was a gloomy "It is too late! I cannot stay in England; my creditors will not let me. Neither can I humble myself to those who, if they forgave, must still in their hearts despise me." He broke from his friend, and the next that was heard of him he wis in Malaya, travelling with a clever but eccentric artist.

As no other tidings have been received of either, there is every reason to fear that in some of their wanderings they offended the natives and were murdered; but the general still clings to a hope that some day his son will trun up again and learn to prize his home and its inmates. If General Haydon still grieves over Laurence's wasted life, it is not as keenly as he used to do, for Harold fills the place in his affections once given to the eon who never prized it. With Daisy—now acknowledged as his daughter-in-law—always by his side, as devoted and more tender than of old, and with a gallant young soldier entering upon just as brave and honourale a career as his own has been, how can he be unuhappy? While he talked to his grandson, now giving way freely to the liking with which Harold had always inspired him, Ambra, who, feeling herself in the way, had retreated to her room, was suddenly clasped in a warm embrace. Ic was Lois who had stolen upon her. She was dressed fur walking and looked strangely pale and resolute. "I have come to bid you goodbye, to charge you with all sorts of loving messages for the rest. Tell them I wouldn't have skulked away like this only I was afraid I should play the baby if I saw their dear faces again." "But where are you going?" "Where should I go but to granny! Did you not hear them say that I was an impostor? That I had no right to be here, no right even to the clothes I wear, and still less to the love and kindness grandfather—l mean General Haydon—has given me?" • "But. Lois, you will not be happy in the forest now! You would pine for the " "Hush, you must not remind me of what I am losing!" Lois interposed agitatedly. "Don't you see I ought to go? They would not like to send me away, although they would wish me gone." "And Harold?" A spasm of the deepest suffering passed across the pallid features of the girl, but she answered firmly, "He must learn to forget me." "He will never do that!" and Daisy, who haJ entered the room while she was speaking, came forward to take the now weeping Lois to her bosom. "He is asking for you, and so is his grandfather. Do you know them so little as to think that the one will be.false to his vows, or the other ask it of him?" "But Granny Wakely?" "My child, she was my faithful friend when I had no others. Let me prove my gratitude to her by making you all I could wish my son's wife to fce. Come, Harold waits for you. I should not be so proud as I am of my 'boy if he could be false to his first love." And Loia passed from the arms of Daisy to those of har lover. As soon as Harold has finished hi 3 military education she will be his wife, and none who know her now, bright, handsome, intelligent woman, can discern any traces of the ignorant, awkward rustic of earlier years. Z^

Only Loliie Braysby, older, sillier, arid more spiteful than she used to be, will sometimes amuse herself, and those who are like-minded, by her descriptions of Lois' first appearance at Genera! Haydon's.

Ambra Neville is still an inmate of the general's house, and protests that she shall never marry. She had found occupation and a good use for her wealth in assisting Wilfred Stuart to help the poor, among whom he labours indefatigably. That he loves her is patent to many; but, knowing the disparity in their ages, he has never told her so, contenting himself with her Iriendship, even as she is content to find her happiness in doing good for others.

BY HENRIETTA B. EUTHVEN. Author of "His Second Love," " Corydon's Infatuation," " Daring Dora," " An Unlucky Legacy," Etc., Etc.

' In this she has a able and willing coadjucrix in the deserted wife of Laurence Haydon. ZZZ #ES In some of the poorest districts of the British metropolis, wherever sickness and poverty are rifest, iray be often seen a couple of simply dressed, sweet-faced women, going from house to house on their errands of mercy; but whether you see them there'or in the drawing-room of the now hale old veteran, gracefully dispensing his hospitality, or watching with unselfish pleasure the young couple who are the light of General llaydon's eyes, be sure that, deep down in their hearts, both still sorrowfully cherish the memory of Laurence Haydon. THE END.